No Pants? Let's Ride

You really can see just about anything in the subways of New York City. A video of a rat trying to carry a slice of pizza down the stairs of the subway went viral in fall 2015 of last year — today it has close to 8.9 million views.

But then there are those days when you might wish you could unsee what you see on the subway — and Sunday, Jan. 10 might just have been one of those. That's because nearly 4,000 riders in New York City and all over the world hopped off the platforms and onto trains like any other ordinary day, sans pants.

Sunday was the 15th year of the No Pants Subway Ride. That's right, people have actually been riding — and sitting on! — the New York City Subway willingly without pants for 15 years now. The spectacle is all orchestrated by Improv Everywhere, a New York City-based group whose mission is to cause scenes and pranks in public places.

This year's ride included more than 4,000 pants-less participants on 11 different New York City Subway lines from Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens and more. And the rules are there are no rules, except they don't wear pants. And they go about their ride like nothing is out of the ordinary. Because, of course, nothing is out of the ordinary about riding the New York City Subway without your pants.

The event has grown so popular since it started in 2002 (just seven guys participated back then) riders across the globe — from Tokyo to Jerusalem — jumped on board in their respective cities and dropped their drawers to be part of it this year.

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The No Pants tradition has caught on in other cities, too. Not surprisingly, this guy is riding in Spain.

Marcos del Mazo/Pacific Press/LightRocket via Getty Image

And unlike other "clothing-optional" events across the globe, like the annual Bikinis for Breast Cancer at Sun Peak Resort in British Columbia where women ski, snowboard or telemark down the slope in their bikini tops, all to raise money for the Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation, it appears the No Pants Subway Ride is really for no other reason than shameless fun.